I am not a Vegan

Most people understand “vegan” to mean a person who does not eat any animal-based foods. Just avoiding animal-based food does not guarantee one a healthy diet, and indeed there are many fat and sick vegans. Usually this is because they eat large amounts of nuts, vegan cheeses which are just as fatty as dairy cheeses, and highly processed fake meats. In other words, a dietary vegan can eat everything that a whole food, plant-based diet allows, and also some really bad stuff, such as deep-fried battered fake chicken made from soy protein isolates, washed down with a large glass of fruit juice (lots of sugar and all the fiber removed), and a refined flour brownie topped by a saturated fat-filled scoop of coconut milk-based fake ice cream. So for me to say I am vegan as a way of communicating my dietary preferences does not really work.

Furthermore, some vegans–call them Vegans with a capital V– believe it is wrong to “repurpose” animals in any way to human ends. They don’t eat honey because it is an animal product, even though it is nutritionally almost identical to maple syrup. They don’t wear leather. Some don’t wear silk or wool. Some oppose domesticating animals for work or as pets. They definitely oppose medical experimentation on animals, or the use of animals to test products intended for human beings. Calling myself vegan could misled you into thinking that these are my positions.

To be clear, I love animals. I have almost always lived with pets and have taken great care of them. I have felt understood by animals and sympathetic towards them. But I do not think “love of animals” is one of my defining characteristics. Eating whole food plant-based has freed me to understand the concept of animal rights much better than I ever could when I was still eating cheese, eggs, fish, meat, and yogurt. Many vegans come to it from their compassion for animals. The way animals are treated in factory food operations is a travesty and should be stopped. However, I don’t think that showing people videos of that horrible treatment works very well to get them to stop eating animal-based food. It may ruin their dinner, but that is not a great way to gain a person’s sympathetic attention. For some people, it is the other way around. After living for a while without animal-based food, I was able to consider more deeply the concept of animal rights. I now think it is a valid concept, worthy of discussion. I have stopped buying leather belts and shoes, but I still use my old leather wallet that I have had for over ten years. I am not an animal rights activist. I don’t think the force of law should be used to prevent people from eating steak and eggs. Rather, I hope that people’s enlightened self-interest will so diminish that demand for steak and eggs that no such law would be considered desirable by anyone.

Kathryn and I went to a “vegan meet-up” at a local vegan restaurant. We hoped to meet some other people who ate the way we did, or were at least open to hearing about it. We thought we could make friends with folks with whom we had something in common, could share mutual support and recipes. We were mostly disappointed. The leader of the group ate what I would consider a very unhealthy meal, and talked at length about the benefits of the expensive machine she was selling that produces “alkaline water”. She claimed it had solved all of her health problems. From where we sat, several health problems were quite manifest. It’s a shame she was taken in by a scam I had known about for some time, and it was uncomfortable to sit there and listen to her trying to scam us. I believe she believed it worked, so I said nothing. What’s the point in having an argument with a stranger in which no one will learn anything?